Egyptian Myth and Legend

By Mackenzie, Donald

Book Id: WPLBN0000035075
Format Type: PDF eBook
File Size: 1.6 MB
Reproduction Date: 2005

Title:	Egyptian Myth and Legend
Author:	Mackenzie, Donald
Volume:
Language:	English
Subject:	Literature, Literature & thought, Writing.
Collections:	Classic Literature Collection
Historic Publication Date:
Publisher:	World Ebook Library


Citation APA MLA Chicago Mackenzie, D. (n.d.). Egyptian Myth and Legend. Retrieved from http://self.gutenberg.org/

Excerpt
Egyptian mythology is of highly complex character, and cannot be considered apart from its racial and historical aspects. The Egyptians were, as a Hebrew prophet has declared, a mingled people, and this view has been confirmed by recent ethnological research: the process; of racial fusion begun in the Delta at the dawn of history, says Professor Elliot Smith, spread through the whole land of Egypt. In localities the early Nilotic inhabitants accepted the religious beliefs of settlers, and fused these with their own. They also clung tenaciously to the crude and primitive tribal beliefs of their remote ancestors, and never abandoned an archaic conception even when they acquired new and more enlightened ideas; they accepted myths literally, and regarded with great sanctity ancient ceremonies and usages. They even showed a tendency to multiply rather than to reduce the number of their gods and goddesses, by symbolizing their attributes. As a result, we find it necessary to deal with a bewildering number of deities and a confused mass of beliefs, many of which are obscure and contradictory. But the average Egyptian was never dismayed by inconsistencies in religious matters: he seemed rather to be fascinated by them. There was, strictly speaking, no orthodox creed in Egypt; each provincial centre had its own distinctive theological system, and the religion of an individual appears to have depended mainly on his habits of life. The Egyptian, as Professor Wiedemann has said, never attempted to systematize his conceptions of the different divinities into a homogeneous religion. It is open to us to speak of the religious ideas of the Egyptians, but not of an Egyptian religion....

Table of Contents
· PREFACE · INTRODUCTION · CHAPTER I. Creation Legend of Sun Worshippers · CHAPTER II. The Tragedy of Osiris · CHAPTER III. Dawn of Civilization · CHAPTER IV. The Peasant who became King · CHAPTER V. Racial Myths in Egypt and Europe · CHAPTER VI. The City of the Elf God · CHAPTER VII. Death and the Judgment · CHAPTER VIII. The Religion of the Stone Workers · CHAPTER IX. A Day in Old Memphis · CHAPTER X. The Great Pyramid Kings · CHAPTER XI. Folk Tales of Fifty Centuries · CHAPTER XII. Triumph of the Sun God · CHAPTER XIII. Fall of the Old Kingdom · CHAPTER XIV. Father Gods and Mother Goddesses · CHAPTER XV. The Rise of Amon · CHAPTER XVI. Tale of the Fugitive Prince · CHAPTER XVII. Egypt's Golden Age · CHAPTER XVIII. Myths and Lays of the Middle Kingdom · CHAPTER XIX. The Island of Enchantment · CHAPTER XX. The Hyksos and their Strange God · CHAPTER XXI. Joseph and the Exodus · CHAPTER XXII. Amon, the God of Empire · CHAPTER XXIII. Tale of the Doomed Prince · CHAPTER XXIV. Changes in Social and Religious Life · CHAPTER XXV. Amenhotep the Magnificent and Queen Tiy · CHAPTER XXVI. The Religious Revolt of the Poet King · CHAPTER XXVII. The Empire of Rameses and the Homeric Age · CHAPTER XXVIII. Egypt and the Hebrew Monarchy · CHAPTER XXIX. The Restoration and the End